LoCo News

Wrap up of the San Francisco Ubuntu Global Jam at Gandi

Elizabeth K. Joseph reports on the recent Ubuntu Global Jam held at the Gandi office in San Francisco where the emphasis was on Quality Assurance for Xubuntu. She says about the event: "Aside from some of the hiccups with the trackers, I received really positive feedback from attendees. Looking forward to doing this again in the future!"

LoCo Events

The Planet

Didier Roche: Ubuntu Make 0.5 adds four new platforms

Didier Roche announces the release of Ubuntu Make 0.5 which brings new support for several IDEs and programming languages. He says that the latest version is available in the Vivid archive and also in the PPAs for the 14.04 LTS and 14.10 releases.

Other Community News

Call for translators - Translating the Xubuntu end-user documentation

David Pires calls for help translating the Xubuntu end-user documentation into more languages. He says that the current threshold for inclusion is 80% translated so only the Finnish; Portuguese; and Spanish languages are included by default, but “the French (64.01%), German (65.52%), and Russian (57.77%) translations are realistic candidates to be included in the next release if some more work could be done on them.”

Call for votes: Vacant Developer Membership Board seats

Iain Lane informs us that the Developer Membership Board has started the vote to replace the four members whose terms are expiring. He lists the candidates and says that those eligible to vote should do so by 1200 UTC on 2nd March.

Ubuntu Cloud News

Cloud hosting services made easy

Canonical invite us to joint them for a joint presentation with Atomia to hear about the challenges of deploying OpenStack for public clouds, the pitfalls to avoid, and how to make sure a cloud is truly production-grade. They tell us who the session is aimed at and provide a link to register for the webinar.

The freshest MariaDB now available

Jorge Castro writes “freshest MariaDB is now available to deploy on Ubuntu directly from MariaDB itself.” He lists the features of the MariaDB Juju charm and links to the README file where further information can be found.

Ubuntu Phone News

Cristian Parrino from Canonical about the release of Ubuntu Phone and future plans

At the Ubuntu Phone Insider Event, Sujeevan Vijayakumaran interviews Cristian Parrino about his time at Canonical, the Bq Ubuntu Phone, and refers to a future version of the Ubuntu Edge. Cristian talks about plans for a further Ubuntu Phone manufacturer to be announced before June that will target the US market.

Canonical CEO Jane Silber about Ubuntu Phone

At the Ubuntu Phone Insider Event, Sujeevan Vijayakumaran interviews Canonical's CEO Jane Silber who reveals her favorite features of the Ubuntu phone and how Canonical make money from the phone. She also talks about the differences between Ubuntu, Android and iOS, and compares how scopes and apps differ.

Ubuntu Phone: The hardware

Riccardo Padovani shares some thoughts on the BQ Aquarius E4.5 Ubuntu Edition, as well as responding to criticism. He highlights the increased performance compared to Ubuntu on the Nexus 4, while he criticises the large screen borders and lack of Ubuntu branding. Riccardo then focuses on constructive vs. destructive criticism, and why the Ubuntu project is so important for the world.

Ubuntu delivers a bulletproof workstation platform for media production

Canonical inform us that when Nestle Snipes’s two digital media companies needed a rock-solid stable platform to make their animated sitcoms, and live series they chose Ubuntu. Nestle Snipes says : "Ubuntu is a real workhorse. It handles absolutely everything we throw at it. When it comes down to it, Ubuntu just works."

Project Calico and Canonical: Working Together at #MWC15

Canonical announces that they will be demonstrating Calico deployment at this year’s Mobile World Congress. Calico is a virtual networking technology developed by Metaswitch that integrates with Juju for easy deployment in OpenStack environments.

In The Blogosphere

This Is Bq’s Exclusive Ubuntu Phone Case Accessory

Joey-Elijah Sneddon of OMG! Ubuntu! shows us the exclusive 'Ubuntu Edition' of their popular Duo accessory case designed especially for the Aquaris E4.5. He says that the price is almost €17, and links to bq's website where orders can be placed.

What the Ubuntu phone could mean for open source

In the first column for opensource.com, Jono Bacon introduces himself and writes about Ubuntu’s focus on convergence and what it means for the future of Open Source software. Jono touches on Ubuntu’s scope technology from both a user and developer perspective, and the risks in moving into a new market.

Andrew of WebUpd8 looks at the hardware specification of the first Ubuntu phone, saying "everything's basically unremarkable however, at €169.90, it's a pretty good deal." He also looks at the Scopes, apps, "Magic edges", and embeds a video in his post which shows some of the phone's features. Andrew says in his summary: “Overall, Aquaris E4.5 Ubuntu Edition is a decent phone with a very interesting and innovative OS which I really hope will succeed.”

Bringing the power of Ubuntu to Drones: Erle-Copter's first flight running Snappy Ubuntu Core a grand success!

Manuel Jose of Tech Drive-in reports on the first drone flight powered by Snappy Ubuntu Core on an Erle-Copter drone. He says that Erle Robotics is happy with Snappy Ubuntu, announcing that “The experience so far is amazing and Snappy Ubuntu is super lightweight.”

Ubuntu 15.04 Will Soon Move To The Linux 3.19 Kernel

Michael Larabel of Phoronix quotes from the Ubuntu kernel team minutes to advise that the latest Linux kernel, 3.19, will soon be available in Ubuntu 15.04. He says that anyone wanting to try out the new kernel early can download 3.19 from the Ubuntu Mainline Kernel PPA now.

Ubuntu Phone Sells Out During First Flash Sale

Joey-Elijah Sneddon of OMG! Ubuntu! writes that the BQ Ubuntu Phone sold out during two different flash sales on the same day. He says that due to technical issues affecting the first sale, BQ scheduled a second flash sale which sold out in 10 minutes and they plan to schedule more flash sales, however they say that “they have no plans to put the phone on ‘normal’ sale afterwards”.

Mir 0.11 Released With Many Enhancements

Michael Larabel of Phoronix reports on the release of Mir 0.11, telling us of some of the changes. He links to the change-log for the release, and add that Mir 0.12 is now under development for Ubuntu 15.04 although X.Org Server is still being used by default in a Unity 7 desktop environment.

Featured Audio and Video

Ubuntu Community Q&A - 10th February 2015

Ubuntu Phone: Is It Worth It? (Aquaris E4.5)

Erica Griffin who calls herself “The Technology Nerd Who Likes To Film Stuff“, and was an attendee of the Ubuntu Phone Insider event, reviews her Ubuntu Phone, telling us what she thinks of the device and the OS.

Kubuntu 15.04 (Alpha 2) A Masterpeice In The Making

Jeff Linux Turner says that Kubuntu 15.04 is not very stable being that it is "Alpha2" but is definitely a step forward for anyone that loves KDE. He shows in this video how Kubuntu 15.04 will offer the KDE Plasma 5 Desktop Environment, which is filled with a modern up to date touch.

Glossary of Terms

Ubuntu - Get Involved

The Ubuntu community consists of individuals and teams, working on different aspects of the distribution, giving advice and technical support, and helping to promote Ubuntu to a wider audience. No contribution is too small, and anyone can help. It's your chance to get in on all the community fun associated with developing and promoting Ubuntu. http://community.ubuntu.com/contribute/